SHE is best known as bitchy sex kitten Chloe Atkinson in the TV soap Emmerdale but next week Amy Nuttall returns to her first love at Birmingham Hippodrome - musical theatre.

"I've always enjoyed singing and musicals are what I always wanted to do," says the 23-year-old flame-haired beauty who takes the role of Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady.

"When I was younger I won a scholarship to study musical theatre and during that time I auditioned for Les Miserables just to see what auditions were like. When they saw me I was offered the understudy role of Christine in Phantom of the Opera. I said 'Are you sure you have the right person?'

"It changed my life. I left school and was with Phantom for two years, taking the lead role on stage around 30 times."

As with her Phantom of the Opera job there was a touch of luck when it came to Amy gaining her role in Emmerdale.

"I asked my agent to look into getting me an audition for a TV show, again just for the experience," she says. "Emmerdale was the first thing that came along and I was offered the job. That was four-and-a-half years ago and time has just flown by.

"But I knew I couldn't stay in a soap, there's a danger of being typecast. Casting directors can be very narrow-minded and tend to pigeonhole you.

"I'd never say I'd never do another soap - but if I was in another it would probably be Coronation Street because it's set in the north and I'm from Bolton."

Not only is Amy launching a new phase of her acting career in My Fair Lady, she's also mounting an assault on the charts with an album, Best Days, released on November 14.

She was signed to EMI Classics after appearing on Celebrity Stars In Their Eyes as Sarah Brightman performing Time To Say Goodbye.

Best Days is a mix of old and new songs, ranging from the folk of Scarborough Fair and Greensleeves to the balladry of Neil Young's Fields Of Gold and the operatic Io Le Canto Per Te.

"I'm quite an odd one when it comes to describing my music," she laughs. "I'm not opera, but I'm not pop. I suppose you could say I was classical crossover."

Amy will be taking a little time out from My Fair Lady to promote her album, with the Eliza role being taken by West End actress Lisa O'Hare.

Says Lisa: "I will be doing two shows a week and Amy will be doing six. It's brilliant, and the best way, really, for a role as big as this which is so challenging and tiring."

Amy adds: "We have been working very closely together learning the part together and helping each other. We have been side-by-side every step of the way. It's the only way... if we were in competition with each other it just wouldn't work."